


a place to call home

by elumish



Series: A Just City [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Adoption, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Gringotts Wizarding Bank, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-05
Updated: 2019-06-05
Packaged: 2020-04-08 03:02:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,754
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19098430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elumish/pseuds/elumish
Summary: There's too much pureblood in him, he thinks, because he learned of wars, at home, at Grimmauld Place, wars that his ancestors had fought in, true wars, honorable wars.





	a place to call home

The first time Sirius goes outside as a free man, he half-expects to be accosted, either by a Dementor or by some well-meaning parent who still thinks he's a mass murderer. He's been a supposed mass murderer for nearly all of his adult life--and how bizarre is that, that he's a true adult, not whatever he was when he was of-age but only just, fighting in a war he realizes now he didn't understand.

Nobody understood that war, he thinks, other than perhaps Dumbledore. It was a war of secrets and lies, and that's no true war.

There's too much pureblood in him, he thinks, because he learned of wars, at home, at Grimmauld Place, wars that his ancestors had fought in, true wars, honorable wars. The Goblin Wars, in every iteration, not wizards fighting against wizards.

Not that there haven't been wizarding wards before--he knows all about Grindelwald, a man who his parents would have fought for if he had been British, perhaps. If he had demanded a different sort of loyalty. But even that war had less deceit than He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's war.

Or perhaps it had had just as much deceit, but that's just not the part of war that people speak about. That isn't the great battles, the great victories.

Nobody wins, like that.

But regardless, nobody spits on Sirius when he steps into Diagon Alley. Nobody curses him, nobody curses at him, and there are eyes, yes, eyes that follow him, but he will take that over the walls of Grimmauld Place that were once his prison and have been again.

Given his choice, he would never step foot in that place again, but the Order still needs it for their headquarters, and so he still needs to go there as well.

He goes to Gringotts first, not only because he has no money but also because he has some things to sort.

The goblins watch him as he walks in, and when he reaches the desk he says, "I wish to speak to the Black account manager."

"Key?" the goblin demands.

"Lost," Sirius says, because it's somewhere in Grimmauld Place, but he has no interest in looking for it. "I'll provide blood."

The goblin bares his teeth at him, then gestures for Sirius to walk past the desk. He's shown directly to an office, where a different goblin is sitting behind a high desk. Sirius recognizes him, vaguely, but the memory is tangled in the way so many memories from before Azkaban are.

"Sirius Black," the goblin says. He slides a piece of paper and a knife across the desk towards Sirius; Sirius cuts into his thumb, smearing the blood against the paper; it sinks in and turns black, then flares out into a mark that Sirius can't read. Some sort of goblin rune, he thinks, but he doesn't particularly care.

The goblin slides the paper back towards himself with a single long-nailed finger, peering at it intently. After a thorough examination of it, he nods. "Which vault would you like to enter?"

"First," Sirius says, "there's a vault I want to check on and another I want to set up."

"I see. What information would you like to confirm about which vault?"

"I have a vault set up for Remus Lupin which should have automatic yearly deposits from my main personal vault. I want to know if those deposits have been happening and whether the vault has ever been accessed."

The goblin turns around and pulls a massive book from the shelf behind him, leafing through it with quick fingers. Everything in it is written in the same runic language as the blood confirmation, or so it appears.

"The yearly deposits of five hundred galleons did occur without fail, though the vault has not been accessed since it was established."

Damn it, Remus. Though Sirius supposes he can't be that surprised, given that Remus thought that he was a traitor. If only Remus had had fewer scruples, he would have used it anyway, just to get back to Sirius, but it's hardly a shock that he didn't.

"Thank you," he says. "Next, I want to set up a trust vault for Harry James Potter, for him to be able to access immediately. Start it with..." He taps a finger on the desk. "A thousand galleons, I'd say, and inform me if it reaches below 100 galleons. And lastly, I need you to open access to Black Manor to Harry Potter."

"He will need to come in," the goblin says. "Blood will be required."

Sirius knows that many of the newer pureblood families, and especially the halfbloods and muggleborns, are more squeamish about using blood for rituals and such, but it's how he was raised. It's how the Blacks have operated for longer than most family lines have existed, and as much as he's moved away from the family, he can't help seeing the utility in using blood. It works better than most other things, and it _holds_ when other things would fail.

Just like the the Blacks.

It had been a surprise to hear James deriding blood rituals in Hogwarts, to see Remus and the traitor cringing at the thought of it. He had kept his mouth shut, but he's always seen it as one of the less objectionable things that the Blacks have done.

He hopes Harry doesn't have the same sort of issues with it as James, because he wants to be able to show Harry the better parts of pureblood life and of being from an old, old family. 

He can't give Harry much, not as broken as he is now, but he can give him that much. 

"I'll bring him in," he says. "And prepare for a blood adoption ritual as well. I'm not sure we'll use that, but have it prepared just in case. Take the fee from the main Black vault."

"Very well," the goblin says, making a note in the book. if "Provide us with a date and any further information as needed."

\--

Sirius wants to go to Black Manor next--he has fewer bad memories of it, because they never lived there, and by the time he was a child it was only being used for entertaining, his mother determined not to leave Grimmauld Place if she could help it--but the Order is more important, and so is Harry, so he goes back to Grimmauld Place.

it somehow looks even more oppressive now that he's left it, now that he's walked into London's weak sunlight, now that he's turned his face to the sky and felt the rain on his cheeks, but he can hold on to the fact that he can leave now, he can go somewhere else and be himself without fear.

He has to hold on to that, or returning to Grimmauld Place will drive him mad.

Remus is puttering around the kitchen when Sirius gets there, a cup of tea in one hand like he made it and promptly forgot about it before putting it down. His head jerks up when Sirius opens the door, his mouth opening like a scolding is on the tip of his tongue. But then he closes it again and smiles.

"I forgot," Remus says, "for a moment."

"I'm safe."

"As much as any of us are," Remus replies, then looks down at the mug in his hand, clearly startled by it. He takes a sip, then grimaces. "This was probably cold half an hour ago. Did you get what you needed, then?"

Sirius drops down in one of the horrid kitchen chairs, turning it around and straddling it so he can look at Remus and drum his fingers on the back of it at the same time. "I learned that you haven't touched the vault I set up for you, for one."

Remus flushes, taking another determined--if masochistic--sip from his mug. "You were a mass murderer; I was hardly going to march into Gringotts and demand access to one of your vaults."

"It's your vault," Sirius says, a years' old argument. "And besides, what better fuck you would there have been to mass-murderer-me than to use all of my money?"

"Hardly all of your money. And besides, it bothers you more that I didn't use it, doesn't it?" Remus shakes his head. "I wanted to...distance myself, from you. Forget you, when I could. Using your money would hardly have helped with that."

Hearing that hurts less than Sirius expected, not least of which because he had already known it. "Well I'll expect you to use it now, or maybe I'll just take to owling you a few galleons a day until you hardly remember what it's like not to have galleons in your pockets." This has been the most longstanding fight of theirs, Sirius's attempts to give Remus money and Remus's refusal to take it. Sirius can understand pride, certainly; he has too much of his own. But he hates that Remus won't let him keep him safe, warm, fed.

"Otherwise," Sirius says, to keep both of them from going down that road again right now, "I asked the goblins to set up the ritual to allow Harry access to the Black Manor." He doesn't mention the blood adoption ritual, and not only because he knows Remus doesn't approve of that sort of magic. He doesn't want to talk to anyone about it until he knows whether Harry wants it, so there's less pressure on Harry if he doesn't. And because...because he doesn't want the reminders, if Harry refuses.

Mrs. Potter had offered a blood adoption to Sirius, a month after he'd left his parents, when they were both sitting in the family sitting room in the middle of the night, Sirius too shaky to even contemplate sleeping after a particularly bad nightmare. She had said it softly, but without hesitation; Mr. Potter's brother had married a Black, but Mrs. Potter was from the older line, the truer one.

Sirius had said no, though he had wanted to say yes, desperately. He was imposing enough of himself on the Potters as it stood, without forcing himself on their family line, as well. The Potters had no need for the Black madness tainting their line.

But Harry is...Harry is brilliant and clever and the best of James combined with the best of Lily, and he's just so damn _good_.

And the way he looked when he was brought from the dementor attack, with those marks on his throat from his fucking family--

Sirius wants to give him a little stability, if he can. As much as Sirius could ever be considered stable, but he can't be worse than Petunia fucking Dursley, and he loves Harry more than anything. 

"He'll want to live with you," Remus says, because Remus knows everything. "I haven't seen him as happy as when he's with you."

Sirius lets out a breath. "I need him to survive this, Remus. I can't lose him, too."

"I know." Remus walks over to stop in front of him, brushing a piece of hair out of Sirius's face. "I can't lose you, either."

Sirius licks his lips, feeling the heat of Remus's hand where it hovers just an inch from his skin. "I've seen you making eyes at my cousin."

"Tonks is...nice to be around. I enjoy her company. But she's young, Sirius, and she's not you."

"What are you saying, then?"

Remus's thumb touches his temple. "You know as well as I that relationships during wartime are tricky, and we are not Lily and James to make it work despite that. But as something to consider, after this is done. As something to hold on to."

Sirius wants that so badly he aches for it, but he has to ask, "Why now?"

"I didn't let myself consider after, before. But you're _free_ , and I never thought you would be, and so I am considering that now, even as we are embarking in this war." Remus leans down towards him, and Sirius tilts his head up--

And then from behind them comes a voice, exclaiming, "Oh! I didn't realize anyone was in here."

Remus rests his forehead against Sirius's, huffing out a laugh, and then he lifts his head to look behind Sirius and say, "Hello, Molly. "

"I thought..." Molly says, sounding flustered. "Well, no matter. I was coming to start dinner, so why don't you boys head off so I can get to work."

Sirius fucking hates being dismissed in his own home, and so he's glad his face is to Remus's chest when Remus says, "Why don't you give us a few minutes, Molly."

"Of course," Molly says. "But not too long, please."

Sirius waits until her footsteps retreat entirely before saying, "I'm not a fucking schoolboy to be--"

"She means well," Remus says, but he sounds tired as he pulls away. "She's dedicated much of her life to children, to her children--"

"I'm not a _child_."

"I know." Remus presses a kiss to the center of Sirius's forehead, like Sirius used to do for him when Remus was laid up in bed, recovering from the full moon. "Please try to play nice. We're all going to be here regardless of how well you get along."

"I will," Sirius says. "But I won't stand for her telling me how to raise Harry. I know how many children she's raised, I even like her children, but he is not her child, he's James and Lily's, and I know better than her how they would want him to be raised."

"I know," Remus says reassuringly. "I know, Sirius."

Sirius nods, feeling his anger fade into something closer to exhaustion. He's been like this since getting out, though it's gotten better than it was. A symptom of having had his emotions flattened and fucked with for over a decade; his body doesn't know how to handle them anymore, and some days he'll oscillate between a dozen emotions an hour, leaving him tired and withdrawn.

He'll be better by the time Harry's going to come live with him. He has to be, for Harry's sake.

\--

He considers not mentioning the blood adoption in his letter to Harry, but he wants to keep as few secrets as he can manage, in defiance of his Black roots, so he mentions it as well as the ritual for accessing the Black Manor, stressing in his letter that he wants Harry to do it but that it is Harry's choice, and that Harry will be able to live with him regardless.

Harry's letter comes back so quickly Sirius would have thought he must have sent it off before receiving Sirius's if it hadn't mentioned the ritual. And he wants to do it, Sirius reads, he wants to do it, and Sirius's heart's soars and he leaps up, shouting for Remus, and when Remus appears in the doorway Sirius wraps his arms around him and plants a kiss squarely on his lips before pulling away, too excited to stay still.

"What--Sirius, what's going on?"

Sirius beams at Remus, waving the letter in his direction. "Harry said yes, he said yes, he said _yes_."

"Yes to _what?_ " Darting forward, Remus snatches the letter from Sirius's hand, skimming through it, and Sirius can see when he reaches the part about the blood adoption because he twitches, a smile growing on his face. "You asked him if you could adopt him? I thought you were just going to--I thought it was just access to the Black Manor."

Sirius pulls the letter back, because he wants to see it, wants to hold on to it, needs proof his unreliable memory can't deny that Harry said _yes_. "I didn't want to say anything until I had asked him, but...I want him to have a parent. And I want him to have the weight of the Black title behind him, if he needs it."

"I'm happy for you," Remus says, and he's smiling, and Sirius can't for the life of him tell if he means it. "I'm so--I wish I could have--" He shakes his head. "No matter. I'm happy for you."

"You did help him," Sirius says, bounding back over to him. "You taught him something that saved his life, that saved both of us. You taught him _magic_ , Remus. In that way you're more his parent than I am."

"I was his professor--"

"Did you see yourself as just his professor?" Sirius doesn't wait for Remus to answer, because he knows the answer. "Then you taught him magic, like a parent does, and you did it because you love him like a parent does, and fuck that the Ministry says that werewolves aren't fit parents, because they're _wrong_."

"You don't need to reassure me--"

"When have I ever been reassuring in my life?"

Remus laughs a little shakily. "True."

"Come on, let's celebrate by making out somewhere until someone catches us. It'll be just like old times."

\--

Sirius meets Harry in Hogsmeade, having gotten permission from Dumbledore to take him to Gringotts for the day. There's some precedent for this, for old rituals that have to be held at certain times or with certain people with little regard for a school year schedule.

Harry's face lights up when he sees Sirius, and he breaks away from Ron and Hermione to hurry over, grinning at Sirius. Sirius smiles back then, unable to resist himself, pulls Harry into a hug, relishing in the feeling of him here, in his arms.

"So," Harry asks as they're making the way towards the Apparition point, having said goodbye to his friends, "how does this work, exactly? Do you replace my dad as my biological father or something? Is that what makes it a blood adoption?"

"Oh, Merlin, no." Sirius had forgotten that Harry isn't a pureblood and wasn't even wizard-raised; he's known what a blood adoption is since he was five or six. "A blood adoption essentially makes me a third parent, less a removal of one of them than an addition of me. I would never want to make you less James and Lily's."

"So does that do anything, or is it just the magic way of adopting someone?"

"It makes you my heir, for one thing. You already are, to some degree--even without this, if I died you would inherit everything I have to give you. But the blood adoption makes you the _Black_  heir, meaning that the title and everything that's entailed will pass along to you, too, and to your children. Disinheriting is even harder from a blood adoption, though of course that's not a concern." Harry eyes him in a way that suggests he thinks it might be a concern, which Sirius decides they can talk about later. "Technically, it'll make you a little more pureblood; James was, of course, but blood adoption into a pureblood line, especially one like the Blacks--as batshit crazy as most of us are--means that, by most, you would be considered a pureblood as well. Not that any of that matters, of course."

Harry is squinting at him, and Sirius is about to ask if he's still sure he wants to do it when Harry asks, "Are you sure this is legal?"

James's son through and through, there. "Technically, yes."

"Technically?"

"It's not illegal," Sirius says, "in that it doesn't technically count as blood magic, and goblin magic involves more blood than ours. The Ministry can't go after either of us for this, I promise."

"Does it hurt?"

"It won't hurt you," Sirius hurries to reassure him. "I've heard it's quite a pleasant experience."

Harry frowns at him. "Will it hurt _you_?"

"A bit, I expect."

Harry jerks away from him, stopping to stare balefully at him. "We shouldn't do it then, not if it'll hurt you. I thought--I mean, I thought if it would hurt anyone, it would be me, because I'm the one getting something from it, you know. But not--"

Sirius's throat closes at the thought of not adopting Harry, not when he's so close, and he has to swallow before he can cut in to say, "I'm getting something from this, too. I'm getting _more_ , I'm getting _you_. And the pain, it won't be much, it won't be a lot, it's no reason not to do this. Please, don't..." Sirius rubs at the ache in his chest. "I want to adopt you more than anything. Please."

Harry keeps staring at him, and he looks...something, he looks unhappy, he looks some emotion Sirius doesn't know how to read, and Sirius will beg, he will, if it'll keep Harry from changing his mind. There's nothing Sirius can give James now, other than this. 

"I'm getting a parent out of this," Harry says finally. "I don't know what you're getting that's worth more than that."

"I'm adding somebody to my family line." Harry clearly doesn't get this, so, tentatively, Sirius steps closer to him. When Harry doesn't move away, Sirius reaches up to cup his cheek. He looks so like James, here. "Pureblood families are notorious for not breeding many children. The Blacks are somewhat of an exception; my great-grandparents were amazing, there being five. The Weasleys are extraordinary. But your dad's parents only managed him, late in life, and my mother had four miscarriages before I was born and another two after that before she had Regulus. To be able to add a healthy child, a brilliant, magically-powerful child, to be able to adopt an _heir_..."

Sirius brushes Harry's hair out of his face, smoothing his thumb over the scar there. Harry shudders but otherwise can't seem to manage to look away from him. "And I love you, and I want to be your parent. I would give a little pain--I would give more than a little pain--to be able to do that."

"But you shouldn't have to," Harry protests.

"I don't have to." This is the part of dark magic that Sirius always understood best, even hating it, even reviling it. You have to want to do dark magic, to do it. You can be coerced, you can do it at wandpoint, but you can't be imperiused to do it. And unwilling dark magic is rarely successful, and even more rarely effective. "I want to."

Harry stares at him for a while longer, then nods, ducking his head away from Sirius's hand. "Okay. Yeah. Okay."

**Author's Note:**

> Originally I was going to show the blood ritual in this one, but I decided not to because otherwise this would never get posted.


End file.
